7 Rookie Email Marketing Mistakes – Mistake #2: The Shotgun Approach

Over the next couple of weeks I’ll be posting my 7 Rookie Email Marketing Mistakes here on  Business 2 Community (follow me on twitter for a heads-up when each post goes live).

If you recognize any of these mistakes in your own campaigns, it’s time to step up your game and start seeing what real email marketing success looks like.

Rookie Mistake #2: The Shotgun Approach 

This approach is based on the misconception – the more you tell, the more you sell. Put in simple terms, it’s lazy marketing. If an email is not relevant to its target audience it will not be as effective as it should be. Worse than this, it will also reduce the success of your future campaigns, drive unsubscriptions and spam complaints. So why do people continue to blast their entire list with untargeted emails? Because email is such an effective marketing tool – it delivers results. But they could be better. Think long term, think targeted.

Tips to Help You Put the Shotgun Down

–          Start Segmenting Your Lists Now: Segment your lists according previous interactions such as purchases or inquiries. Updating the forms on your website and getting a grip on orders as and when they come in will make this task very easy moving forward. Learn how one company started segmenting their historic data with a simple email competition:  http://blog.icontact.com/blog/what-kind-of-fisherman-are-you/

–          Plan Ahead: Line up multiple campaigns for your various products or services which can be carefully matched to relevant groups of subscribers in your list. By having a series of campaigns waiting to go should go a long way to preventing you from panicking and hitting your entire list with a hastily constructed campaign. 

–          Check Your Stats and Realign Your Strategy for Success: You already know that your shotgun approach isn’t really working that well. How much better could you open and click-through rates be? Are you seeing a Return on Investment (ROI)? Email marketing works, the evidence is out there, but only if you put the work in, so it’s time to get more strategic.

See previous post in the series:

Rookie Mistake #1: The Monthly Newsletter

Stop Making Rookie Mistakes – Download iContact’s 10 Rules for Successful Email Marketing GuideToday.